 |
SwiftVets.com
Service to Country
|
| View previous topic :: View next topic |
| Author |
Message |
RogerRabbit
Master Chief Petty Officer
Joined: 05 Sep 2004
Posts: 748
Location: Oregon
|
 Posted: Wed Apr 27, 2005 2:04 pm Post subject: GOP to Reverse Ethics Rule Blocking New DeLay Probe |
 |
|
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/04/26/AR2005042601295.html
| Quote: | January Change Led Democrats to Shut Down Panel
By Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, April 27, 2005; Page A01
House Republican leaders, acknowledging that ethics disputes are taking a heavy toll on the party's image, decided yesterday to rescind a controversial rule change that led to the three-month shutdown of the ethics committee, according to officials who participated in the talks.
Republicans touched off a political uproar in January by changing a rule that had required the ethics committee to continue considering a complaint against a House member if there was a deadlock between the committee's five Republicans and five Democrats. The January change reversed this, calling for automatic dismissal of an ethics complaint when a deadlock occurs.
House Majority Leader Tom DeLay gets a lift from President Bush in Texas.
House Majority Leader Tom DeLay gets a lift from President Bush in Texas. (By Gerald Herbert -- Associated Press)
Democrats rebelled against that and other changes -- saying Republicans were trying to protect House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) from further ethics investigations -- and blocked the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct, as the ethics panel is officially known, from organizing for the new Congress.
Republicans on the committee say they will launch an investigation of DeLay's handling of overseas trips and gifts as soon as the impasse over the rules is broken. The Washington Post reported last weekend that Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff charged DeLay's airfare to London and Scotland to his American Express card in 2000.
House ethics rules bar lawmakers from accepting travel and related expenses from registered lobbyists. DeLay said that he will meet with the committee chairman and the ranking Democrat, and that his staff is assembling documents to turn over to the committee. The panel admonished DeLay three times last year for what it deemed inappropriate official behavior.
The officials participating in talks about restarting the committee said Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) has agreed to ask the House to vote later this week on a rollback of the rule change. A Republican adviser said the decision "is the speaker's way of trying to put this behind us and get us back to regular order."
"There will be a [political] cost to this, but if he had not done this, the cost would continue to increase," said the adviser, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because Hastert had not announced his decision.
This morning, at a weekly meeting for all House Republicans, Hastert will present options for the rollback package, officials said. The officials, who demanded anonymity because the negotiations were confidential, said the proposal will include a reversal of the January rule that would automatically dismiss an ethics complaint after 45 days if the committee is deadlocked.
"It's gone," an official said of the automatic-dismissal rule as he emerged from the negotiations.
A House Republican leadership aide said that the automatic-dismissal rule is "the rule that is most commonly believed to be designed to protect Tom DeLay" and that it was "impossible to win the communications battle" on it.
Leaving his office last night, Hastert would not say what form his recommended changes will take and suggested that one option might be to lengthen the time before the automatic dismissal occurs, to perhaps 90 or 120 days.
"Sooner or later, there has to be a resolution -- people can't be dangled out there forever," Hastert said. "I think [the January changes] were good, fair things for the Congress -- everybody. But, you know, that is the point of contention. We can't move forward, we can't organize, we can't do the work that the ethics committee needs to do."
The ethics committee's top Democrat, Rep. Alan B. Mollohan (W.Va.), said that if the Republicans rescind all three rules changes made in January, Democrats would vote to let the ethics committee operate. "That would return you to rules that were fashioned in a bipartisan way," he said. Without a full reversal, Democrats will demand creation of a bipartisan ethics task force, he said.
The ethics committee's chairman, Rep. Doc Hastings (R-Wash.), will support a vote on rule changes because he believes it is the only practical way to get the committee functioning, sources said. Hastings recently sought -- and received from the GOP leadership -- a large increase in the committee's budget and staff.
The vote planned for later this week will mark the second time in four months that House Republicans have changed a rule but then changed it back under public pressure because the changes were perceived as designed to protect DeLay.
Last November, Republicans rewrote an 11-year-old party rule that required a party leader to step aside if indicted, and instead made it possible for such a leader to maintain the party position. A grand jury in Austin was investigating the campaign finances of a political action committee created by DeLay and his political associates. After public objections to the maneuver, DeLay asked his party colleagues to rescind that change when they returned to Washington on Jan. 3 for the 109th Congress, and they did.
The next day, the full House approved -- on a largely party-line vote of 220 to 195 -- changes that Democrats contended would make it harder to launch investigations and would undermine their effectiveness.
A congressional aide said that changing the rules will mean "a couple of great days for Democrats" but that Republicans have calculated this will deny them long-term use of the ethics issue heading into next year's midterm elections. |
_________________
"Si vis pacem, para bellum" |
|
| Back to top |
|
 |
GM Strong
Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy
Joined: 18 Sep 2004
Posts: 1579
Location: Penna
|
| Posted: Wed Apr 27, 2005 7:40 pm Post subject: |
|
|
It will also subject a lot of Dems to investigation. Notably Bhagdad Jim McDermott.
_________________
8th Army Korea 68-69 |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
RogerRabbit
Master Chief Petty Officer
Joined: 05 Sep 2004
Posts: 748
Location: Oregon
|
| Posted: Wed Apr 27, 2005 7:57 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| GM Strong wrote: | | It will also subject a lot of Dems to investigation. Notably Bhagdad Jim McDermott. |
Sometimes you have to be careful what you wish for
_________________
"Si vis pacem, para bellum" |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Navy_Navy_Navy
Admin
Joined: 07 May 2004
Posts: 5777
|
| Posted: Thu Apr 28, 2005 12:46 am Post subject: |
|
|
And Nancy Pelosi! (Oh, I need a little touchdown dance, here!  )
Twelve possible travel/ethics violations by Pelosi and staff - suddenly Pelosi does not want this reversal in procedures! I'm shocked, I tell you!  Shocked!
In fact, after Denny Hastert's concession and agreement to try to work this out, she accused the GOP of wanting to switch the rules back in order to support Delay and brought up the issue of "staffing" - staffing of WHAT? And why is staffing of ANYTHING an issue all of a sudden?! It hasn't been an issue before - and it's a non sequitur, now!
Add to it all the other libs who are going to get caught up in their own net with this desire to move back to the "old rules" and this is a good day!
Maybe Tom Delay will finally get the chance to clear his name. That's all he's been asking for all along.
_________________
~ Echo Juliet ~
Altering course to starboard - On Fire, Keep Clear
Navy woman, Navy wife, Navy mother |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
srmorton
PO2
Joined: 07 Aug 2004
Posts: 383
Location: Jacksonville, NC
|
| Posted: Thu Apr 28, 2005 1:30 am Post subject: |
|
|
I agree, Navy X3. I don't think that this is a bad thing at all. The rules
changes were perfectly reasonable, but they have been serving as cover
for the "do-nothing party". The Dems have been getting away with
blaming the Republicans and complaining about the rules change at the
same time that they have been refusing to allow the Ethics Committee
to convene. Since it is an evenly divided committee, it is impossible to
have a quorum unless at least one Democrat shows up. Since they now
have no reason to prevent the organization of the committee, they have
left themselves open to ethical inquiries concerning their own members.
_________________
Susan R. Morton |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
GM Strong
Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy
Joined: 18 Sep 2004
Posts: 1579
Location: Penna
|
| Posted: Thu Apr 28, 2005 1:40 am Post subject: |
|
|
Seems like San Fran Nan is not so hot on this idea after all. Seems there is enough of the same in her closet that Stretch is not all that warm to the idea. McDermott is worried as are a bunch of others.
_________________
8th Army Korea 68-69 |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
kman
Lt.Jg.
Joined: 09 Aug 2004
Posts: 132
Location: Diamond Bar, Ca.
|
| Posted: Thu Apr 28, 2005 2:16 am Post subject: |
|
|
You might as well start with the As LOL!
Biggest spenders since 2000:
Snip
Top Trip Takers
John Breaux - Democratic Party - $158,311.92
Robert Wexler - Democratic Party - $155,137.21
Gene Green - Democratic Party - $153,873.02
Maurice Hinchey - Democratic Party - $152,169.25
Cal Dooley - Democratic Party - $148,562.50
Evan Bayh - Democratic Party - $142,884.94
Maxine Waters - Democratic Party - $132,219.23
James Clyburn - Democratic Party - $129,540.79
Philip English - Republican Party - $129,231.54
Jim McDermott - Democratic Party - $128,725.91
Harold Rogers - Republican Party - $126,882.93
Gregory Meeks - Democratic Party - $126,690.08
John Boehner - Republican Party - $126,537.08
F. James Sensenbrenner - Republican Party - $126,424.65
James Greenwood - Republican Party - $121,890.57
George Miller - Democratic Party - $119,368.70
Richard Lugar - Republican Party - $113,279.68
Ed Pastor - Democratic Party - $111,438.89
Philip Crane - Republican Party - $109,994.72
Donald Payne - Democratic Party - $105,503.23
David Price - Democratic Party - $105,047.18
Dana Rohrabacher - Republican Party - $102,982.41
Ander Crenshaw - Republican Party - $102,967.56
Howard Berman - Democratic Party - $97,203.35
Paul Sarbanes - Democratic Party - $93,045.01
Joseph Biden - Democratic Party - $90,906.28
Lloyd Doggett - Democratic Party - $86,084.67
Don Nickles - Republican Party - $84,171.90
Tom DeLay - Republican Party - $82,390.71
Shelley Berkley - Democratic Party - $82,359.05
Solomon Ortiz - Democratic Party - $80,835.45
Henry Waxman - Democratic Party - $80,306.69
http://americanradioworks.publicradio.org/features/congtravel/member_by_cost_report.php?limit=100 |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
wonhyo
Seaman Apprentice
Joined: 10 Sep 2004
Posts: 85
|
| Posted: Thu Apr 28, 2005 4:00 am Post subject: Political Money Trips |
|
|
| www.politicalmoneyline is another good site to look at trips these congressman and senators took. On the left hand side of page is US Senate,House Members, click on that and then type in a name or click on a state, once you get a member you want to look at, go to their profile page, and on the bottom on the right hand side look for travel expenses, you will have two options. great reading, have found some members claim the trip twice, look at Evan Bayh's travel expenses between Oct 28 02 and Nov 26 02, he got $30,000.00 to travel to Bejing twice. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
|
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
|
Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group
|
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
